/ Photography Helmut NewtonGalerie d'images
The appearance of Yves Saint Laurent's first smoking in a haute couture collection in 1966 was a revolution. For in this way an article of male apparel was to become the symbol of female emancipation.
From 1966 until 2002, when Yves Saint Laurent bid farewell to haute couture, the famous black garment, now androgynous, would feature in collection after collection in a multitude of forms: dress, jumpsuit, bolero...
The Smoking Forever exhibition relates this long story in a space transformed into a giant chessboard, synonymous with strategy and power struggles.
Nearly fifty models plunge us into a universe dominated by the couturier's favourite colour, black. Yves Saint Laurent transformed woman into a queen who, in her smoking, dares to check the king.
It is a well-known fact that Chanel gave women their freedom; years
later Saint Laurent brought them power. This power had always been held
by men. We should not forget that French women had to wait until 1945
to enjoy the right to vote. Laws were made by men, voted by men and
often gave preference to men. It was rare for women to manage firms or
occupy positions of major importance. Might it have been this very fact
that convinced Yves Saint Laurent, in his own way, to change the order
of things? Perhaps! In any case, it is precisely what he did. Clothing,
as Roland Barthes, amongst others, has said, is a signifier. Never
insignificant, fashion reveals the inner workings of society. Male
clothing was the symbol of power. By appropriating male apparel and
enabling women to wear it, Saint Laurent transferred the attributes of
power from one sex to the other. At that instant he crossed from the
aesthetic domain to the social one - he was never again to leave it.
From then onwards, time and time again, he would return to the
masculine wardrobe for inspiration: the trouser suit, the blazer, the
pea jacket, the safari suit, the trench coat and the tuxedo which
became the famous smoking. When the latter appeared in 1966, it was
clear that fashion had witnessed a major event, to such an extent that
thirty years later French newspaper Le Monde consecrated it an emblem
of the 60s: With this garment borrowed from the male wardrobe, the
couturier introduces trousers into female evening wear. Helmut Newtonss
photograph of the smoking (...) has become one of the most powerful
images of 20th century fashion.
Man and woman suggest androgyny.
However, it is not the case. Each keeps to his or her own place. Saint
Laurents woman is never masculine. On the contrary, she adopts male
dress to emphasise and intensify her femininity.
The world is
filled with talented creators and the 20th century has had more that
its share, but if Chanel and Saint Laurent are the two most important,
it is precisely because transcending their craft they worked on the
very weft of society.
If Haute Couture has more or less
disappeared it is because it existed alongside an art de vivre that is
no more. All other explanations (costs, delivery dates, ready-to-wear,
etc) are quite unfounded. Fashion is a social phenomenon aimed at the
widest possible audience. It must reflect life and not a fantasy world.
This is Yves Saint Laurents rule, forged through rigour and excellence,
the rule to which he has remained faithful throughout his career. Of
course we know that woman is mans equal, but, since Saint Laurent, we
know it better. Shared power, shared apparel. Perhaps it is not really
a coincidence that Saint Laurents work has for years accompanied what
is known as womens liberation.
Todays exhibition presents Yves
Saint Laurents work around le smoking. Always the same and yet never
the same. Etudes and scales for a well-tempered smoking. For nearly
forty years he constantly and obsessively worked and reworked his
creation. His imagination and his determination to assert his
legitimacy over a garment he created and which was to conquer the world
have given rise to several dozen smokings. Presented face to face, the
first (1966) and the last (2002) bear witness, as if it were needed, to
the permanence of a work that was to radically change its times.
29 janvier 1982, 20e anniversaire de la maison de couture.
